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7 September 2017

Tsundoku: Faujis, The Iranian Elections and Mysterious Benefactors

(The first of the book recommendation columns I started doing for Hindu BLink back in May.)

Is
your TBR pile multiplying overnight? Are you faced with dusty
reproachful spines? Do you wonder when you're ever going to catch up
with the most prolific bookstagrammers and shoot pretty pictures of a
cover, some flowers and a hardwood table? Or perhaps you're
overwhelmed by how many new books there are and how you'll never have
time to read them all. Help is on hand. Welcome to Tsundoku, a weekly
books recommendation column, where I break down books into the three
parts that really matter: what everyone's talking about, what's
happening in the world, and what old book you should read (or
re-read) next. (“Tsundoku” a word borrowed from Japan means
basically buying new books only to leave them in a pile next to the
other books you bought and haven't gotten around to reading.)

Water Cooler: Anuja
Chauhan's books are always fun, because she takes commercial fiction
and wraps it up in a big Bollywood style extravaganza. Each of her
books are pacey, full of action and the kind of dialogues you might
use amongst yourselves—liberal lashings of Hinglish and long odes
to men's bottoms. Her latest, Baaz,
just came out to the delighted squeals of women aged anywhere from 19
to 40. Each of Chauhan's books have a main central theme: her first
The Zoya Factor
was about cricket, followed by books about politics, Delhi in the
'70s and Doordarshan, and family disputes over property. Baaz
is the Air Force book, peppered with fauji language and in an
interesting departure for Chauhan—deals more with the
India-Pakistan war in the '70s than the romance. Which is not to say
the romance isn't heady and exciting, but Baaz
marks Chauhan as a skilled writer of action as well as relationships,
as well as being the first time she writes a male protagonist, the
dashing Ishaan Faujdaar, nicknamed Baaz. Ishaan is a small-town boy
turned sophisticated army officer, with “kota grey” eyes and a
sense of chivalry and patriotism that bowls over photographer Tehmina
Dadyseth, herself an army daughter, who has many reasons to hate all
that life represents. Read for the loving descriptions of army life
in India, and touching bromances, but perhaps ignore the superhero
ending. Baaz byAnuja Chauhan, Harper Collins, Rs 399

Watchlist:
The first Iran elections since the nuclear agreement of 2015 happened
this week, with voting underway as I write this. A great way to
understand Tehran and the people who live there is by reading Ramita
Navai's award winning book of essays City Of Lies: Love, Sex,
Death And The Search For Truth In Tehran.
All the eight essays are about controversial people in the current
regime—a sex worker, a trans woman, a thug, just to give a few
examples, and are spun out of several interviews Navai did while she
was living in Tehran as a journalist. Written almost as short
stories, Navai goes deep into the psyche of each subject—what was
their family life like? What did they eat or drink? What did they
wear?---and makes you feel as though you've travelled to the city
itself and spoken to the people. My particular favourite was the
essay about Someyeh, a traditional religious girl who marries her
dashing first cousin, only to realise that marriage is not all it's
cracked up to be. Bonus: you'll be reminded very much of India as you
read, especially the descriptions of the traffic and the heavy
pollution. City Of Lies: Love, Sex, Death And The SearchFor Truth In Tehran byRamita Navai, Hachette, Rs 399.

Way back: If you're looking for something light after all that
heavy, consider the cupcake of a book that is Daddy-Long-Legs
by Jean Webster. An epistolary novel, with little illustrations, it's
sweet, funny and (well deservedly) a classic. Published in 1912, the
book is letters from orphan Jerusha “Judy” Abbott to a mysterious
benefactor she calls Daddy-Long-Legs, as part of a deal he strikes up
with her—he'll send her to college if she writes him a weekly
letter telling him how she's faring. Along the way, Judy transforms
from a little orphan girl to a popular college student and makes many
friends, but also the mysterious “Daddy” changes from a detached
anonymous trust fund, to someone who begins to support her through
her four years in college. Premise sound familiar? The book was the
inspiration for the 1984 Malayalam movie Kanamarayathu,
which then had a Hindi remake in 1986 called Anokha Rishta.
Daddy-Long-Legsby
Jean Webster, free online on Project Gutenberg, Scholastic(paperback), Rs 105.